MiWay Wally Hayward Marathon

Dear Runners

First of all, thank you so much for your patience and understanding for yesterday's most regrettable situation where we misled a large number of runners which resulted in them running approximately 3km extra. We as the organising committee take full responsibility. 

From myself and on behalf of the MiWay Wally Hayward Marathon of 2024, please accept our sincere apology.

In cooperation with our timing partners (FinishTime) we did some analysis on the data. Various scenarios were analysed. We had several timing spots along the route, the 1st one being 7.3km from the start. After careful analysis we determined that the most accurate way to determine how many runners did an extra 3km (approximately) was by looking at runners who ran the first 7.3km, which includes the added 3km, thus making it 10.3km, in an average pace of 90 seconds slower than the rest of the marathon.

We were able to determine that 1 827 runners did an additional 3km. That is a combination of 21km and 42km runners. The rest of the approximately 6000 runners did the correct route.

We then presented this to the ASA Road Running Chairperson, the Comrades Marathon Assosiation, various other stakeholders and also reached out to The Running Mann to assist us with our statistical analysis. 

We can confirm that all the relevant stakeholders gave their stamp of approval in terms of our methodology and calculations. The changes were subsequently applied to the affected runners and published on the official results page on FinishTime. The "Adjusted Time" as shown on the results may therefore be used as a Comrades Qualifying time.    

We have prioritized the above in order to address the queries regarding runners who used the MiWay Wally Hayward Marathon as a Comrades qualifier.

We are also attending to all other queries. 

A complete statement detailing the finding of our investigation will be published in the next few days. 

In the meantime, please direct all queries to info@wally.co.za or to my personal address at racedirector@wally.co.za. We are working through all the mails and will answer as soon as humanly possible, prioritizing the queries as they come in. 

Yours in running

Francois Jordaan
Race Director
MiWay Wally Hayward Marathon